California fishermen have capitalized on favorable ocean conditions with a historic three-year haul of market squid, whose cylindrical bodies are most recognizable in appetizer form: sliced, breaded and deep-fried. These small squid make up the state's largest fishery by both weight and value, having brought in roughly $68.5 million in 2011.

Fishermen netted a record-breaking 133,642 tons of the cephalopods during the 2010-11 season, then topped that mark the following year with 134,910 tons, according to the California Department of Fish and Game. This season's catch was also robust, though it is expected to fall a bit short of those staggering totals.

More than 80 percent of the state's market squid are typically caught in Southern California around the Channel Islands, and most of the rest are netted in Monterey Bay. But this year brought unprecedented fishing activity to the San Mateo County coast, said Mike McHenry, one of only a couple of people who fish squid out of Pillar Point Harbor north of Half Moon Bay.

"This is by far the biggest season we've ever seen up in this country," said McHenry, who also operates a fish-unloading station on Johnson Pier. "A lot of out-of-town boats came up."

Indeed, the Nov. 15 start of Dungeness crab season was rendered more chaotic than usual by the arrival of five Southern Cal Seafood vessels that needed to unload about 320 tons of squid. A representative for the company said its boats had never before fished the waters off Half Moon Bay.

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Fishermen and industry experts attribute the abundance to cool La Niña periods over the past two winters that provided extra food for young squid in the form of plankton and krill. The squid live near the surface and at medium depths in coastal seas from Baja California to Alaska.

Market squid are often attracted to light, so fishermen typically catch them at night using high-powered lanterns, trapping entire schools with circular nets called purse seines. Once they're caught, experts say, they wind up in restaurants and grocery stores here and abroad. Much of the catch is exported to China.

In 2005 the state established a catch-limit system under which the season is shut down once 118,000 tons of market squid are caught. The catch has exceeded that amount in recent years, in part because squid are caught accidentally by fishermen hunting for other species. The 2012-13 season was called to a halt Nov. 21 when the limit was reached.

With La Niña having abated, the market squid industry is likely beginning a downward cycle, said Diane Pleschner-Steele, executive director of the California Wetfish Producers Association. Despite their economic and ecological value, their behavior remains mysterious, she said.

"They go where they go and do what they do," Pleschner-Steele said. "We're still trying to have a better understanding."

Market squid
--Also known as opalescent squid for the way light reflects off their bodies, which can change color from milky white to ruddy.
--Their bodies, or mantles, average about 6 inches in length.
--They live about 10 months, spawning on sandy ocean floors before dying.
--As juveniles they feed on plankton and krill. As adults they eat small fish, other squid and small crustaceans.
Source: California Department of Fish and Game